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Science, Technology, and the Environment The Perseverance mission – Looking for Life on Mars ORGANIZER Venn Diagram You will be practicing making notes using a Venn diagram. Th is structure is helpful in comparing and contrasting two or more issues, topics, or points-of-view. It helps you examine similarities and diff erences so you can draw conclusions or create new ideas, perspectives, or opinions. You will use the article “Th e Perseverance Mission – Looking for Life on Mars” to compare and contrast the physical characteristics of Earth and Mars that support life. BEFORE READING • Record the topic and purpose for reading on the Venn diagram. Th en, list what you already know about the topic of the article, Looking for Life on Mars, in the left -hand column. In the right-hand column, write what you want to know or wonder about the topic. For example, What do NASA scientists hope to fi nd? Does this mission have astronauts on board? DURING READING • As you read the article be mindful of questions that arise. Mark the text with a ? each time a new question pops into your head. Write the question in the margin. For example, in the second paragraph you may wonder why it took almost eight months for Perseverance to reach Mars. • Also, make connections. Identify connections with the letters T-S (text-to-self), T-T (text-to-text), or T-W (text-to-world) and make brief notes in the margin to explain the connections. For example, in the second paragraph you and your family may have watched the video as Perseverance touched down on Mars (a text-to-self connection). Or you may remember reading about past Mars missions (a text-to-text connection). • Distinguish relevant facts and arguments supporting the existence of life on Mars, as you compare them to life on Earth. Mark the text with a + for facts and arguments that support the existence of life on Mars and a - for those facts and arguments that are still unknown and need to be proven. For example, the fact that “Mars did indeed have abundant water on its surface in times long past” supports the argument that there may have been life on the planet. AFTER READING • Use the Venn diagram to make notes about the physical characteristics of Earth and Mars. Label the circles Earth and Mars. • To help you organize your notes (and compare the similarities and diff erences more clearly) label each section of the Venn diagram with the following categories: physical geography, climate, water, and oxygen. • Record diff erences for each category in the outside circles and similarities in the overlapping circles. • When you have fi nished recording facts, complete the What I think now section of the organizer. Use the following questions to guide your response: What surprised you about what you read? What new learnings or connections did you make? What questions do you still have? What are your reactions to the information in the article? 2020/2021: Issue 7 What in the world? Level 1 Page 41 2020/2021: Issue 7 Topic: Purpose for reading: – Looking for Life on Mars on Life for Looking – mission Perseverance The Environment the and Technology, Science, What I already know What I wonder • • • • • • • • What in the world? Level 1 Page 42 What I think now Science, Technology, and the Environment The Perseverance mission – Looking for Life on Mars On February 18, dozens failed. For this one to work, a of scientists were glued to tricky series of manoeuvres had Moon to Mars their screens at the National to unfold. It took true precision Th is is NASA’s 49th mission to Aeronautics and Space to get Percy to the Red Planet, the Red Planet. Nine missions Administration (NASA) control but everything went right. landed on the surface. Four included rovers. Th e most recent centre. Th ey were watching the Phew! fi nal moments of a landing on was the Curiosity rover, which landed on Mars in 2012. Mars. High-defi nition video “I can’t even describe it, how showed the rocky surface getting happy you feel in that moment. I Th e Mars 2020 Perseverance closer as a vessel descended. was screaming and jumping for Mission is part of NASA’s Th en they heard the words happiness,” said Farah Alibay. broader Moon to Mars project. “Touchdown confi rmed.” Th ey Dr. Alibay, a Quebec-born It includes establishing a base leapt to their feet and punched engineer, is part of NASA’s team. and sustainable human presence on the Moon, and using what is the sky in glee. Perseverance set to work right learned for the next giant leap – Th e spacecraft held a one-tonne, away, taking pictures. Th e sending astronauts to Mars. car-sized rover named images showed a dusty, rocky, Perseverance (‘Percy’ for short). desolate, alien landscape. examined meteorites found on Earth that originated on Mars. Percy launched from Earth on Soon the rover was sending July 30, 2020. It navigated some audio recordings, too. For the From this data, we know Mars 470 million kilometres to Mars, fi rst time, humans could listen is a rocky planet like ours. It travelling at 19,000 kilometres to the sound of wind on Mars. has environments a lot like per hour. Th en, it plunged into What we've learned some places on Earth. Iceland, the Martian atmosphere. Antarctica, the Atacama Desert Landing on Mars is no Most of what we already know in Chile, Arizona, and Hawaii cakewalk. About half of NASA’s about Mars comes from decades all have regions similar to some previous Mars missions have of data collected by telescopes places on Mars. and spacecraft . We have also Definitions meteorite: a piece of rock that has fallen from space and landed on the ground 2020/2021: Issue 7 What in the world? Level 1 Page 38 Science, Technology, and the Environment The Perseverance mission – Looking for Life on Mars So far, all the rocks and minerals But NASA knows that Mars did that could truly prove microbial identifi ed on Mars are also have lots of surface water billions life once existed are too large found on Earth. Th e rock is of years ago. Some liquid may and complex to send to Mars. mostly igneous basalt. Basalt still be trapped in minerals in So for now, the rover will collect is the most common rock on the planet’s crust. So the search promising samples. It will encase the Earth’s surface. It makes up for microbe fossils intensifi ed. them in tubes and leave them on large parts of the ocean fl oor. Percy’s ‘To Do’ list the planet’s surface to be brought to Earth at a future date. Like Earth, Mars has an Th e rover landed in Jezero atmosphere, crust, mantle, and Crater. Jezero is a bowl-like Perseverance will also test core. It has two moons. Th e depression some 49 kilometres whether future astronauts could extremely thin atmosphere across. Scientists think that more extract oxygen from the Martian exposes the planet to dangerous than 3.5 billion years ago, river atmosphere. Th is oxygen would levels of ultraviolet space channels spilled over the crater be used for breathing and for radiation. Mars has four seasons. wall to form a large lake. Jezero fuel. As well, the rover will Th e average temperature? A also has a well-preserved imprint try to fi nd a good location for chilly minus 63 degrees Celsius. of a delta. Th ere, a river once left deploying Ingenuity. Ingenuity Signs of life? layers of rocks and sand. is a small, robotic helicopter that made the trip to Mars attached Geologists found the oldest Th e delta is a prime place to fi nd to the rover’s belly. known Mars rock in Antarctica. signs of microbial life. So are the It is called Meteorite ALH84001. minerals left like a bathtub ring NASA wants to see if a Scientists believe that the around the crater’s shoreline. helicopter can fl y in Mars’s thin meteorite formed 4.1 billion atmosphere. Th at atmosphere is Now, astronomers, biologists, years ago. How? An asteroid or just one percent the density of geologists, and physicists will comet likely collided with Mars Earth’s. Th at makes it harder for work together searching for and blasted out a crater. a helicopter to generate the lift ‘biosignatures’ in the rocks. required to get off the ground. Meteorite ALH84001 has Biosignatures provide evidence sparked much debate. In 1996, of ancient life. Tiny fossils on Dr. Alibay says her work with NASA hinted that it might have the planet’s surface were likely NASA has been a privilege. She found signs of microscopic destroyed over hundreds of hopes to help solve a question fossils inside the two-kilogram millions of years. However, some people have asked for thousands rock. Th e evidence wasn’t may be trapped in rocks beneath of years: Does life exists “absolute proof” of past Martian the surface. Percy’s robotic arm elsewhere in the universe? life, but some scientists felt that has a drill to remove buried rock “[Being] part of a team that it pointed in that direction. and soil samples. might start to answer that Not everyone agreed. Life needs Percy will deploy cameras, x-ray question… that is pretty water and there are no lakes, beams, and laser guns to probe incredible,” she says. J rivers, or seas on the Red Planet. the rocks. Scientifi c instruments Definitions delta: an area of land, like a triangle in shape, where a river igneous: produced under conditions involving intense heat has split into several smaller rivers before entering the sea microbes: tiny living things such as bacteria, viruses, fungi 2020/2021: Issue 7 What in the world? Level 1 Page 39 Science, Technology, and the Environment The Perseverance mission – Looking for Life on Mars COMPREHENSION QUESTIONS 1.

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